


Julycanthropy 2020 - Staci Pratt Antholgy

by Prattattack



Category: Far Cry (Video Games), Far Cry 5
Genre: Alternate Universe - Werewolf, Gen, Julycanthropy 2020
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-10
Updated: 2020-07-13
Packaged: 2021-03-04 22:21:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 6,755
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25173802
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Prattattack/pseuds/Prattattack
Summary: Julycanthropy is like Inktober, but instead of 31 days of ink related works of art, it's 31 days of werewolf prompts! I dedicated this whole thing to a Werewolf Staci AU because I'm just a simple soul here and sometimes you gotta make the content you wanna see in the world. Staci Pratt and the places and characters of Far Cry do not belong to me, they belong to Ubisoft.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 3





	1. Prompts

**July 1:** Beginning

**July 2:** Strength

**July 3:** Weakness

**July 4:** Full Moon

**July 5:** Hidden

**July 6:** Exposed

**July 7:** Chill

**July 8:** Burn

**July 9:** Child

**July 10:** Sense

**July 11:** Edge

**July 12:** Rage

**July 13:** Beast

**July 14:** Cage 

**July 15:** Release

**July 16:** Skin

**July 17:** Light

**July 18:** Dark

**July 19:** Bite

**July 20:** Howl

**July 21:** Harmful

**July 22:** Blood

**July 23:** Race

**July 24:** Tear

**July 25:** Within

**July 26:** Without

**July 27:** Guide

**July 28:** Lost

**July 29:** Unlikely

**July 30:** Break

**July 31:** Ending


	2. All Stories Have a Beginning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> July 1: Beginning
> 
> This chapter takes place eight years before the events of Far Cry 5!

“Eustace, promise us you’re going to be safe.”

“I will, Mom.”

“Don’t just say that.”

“I know, Dad.”

“You can always call us if something goes wrong, alright hon?”

Ten months later, and Staci never felt like calling his parents more than in that one specific moment. Junior Deputy Staci Pratt was the lowest on the pecking order, taking orders from Joey who took orders from her partner Danny who took orders from Sheriff Whitehorse. Being the youngest one there at (still) eighteen, he was fucking terrified at the prospect of ever calling Sheriff Whitehorse “Earl”. Not even as a joke. Not even in an internal monologue. That shit would  _ never  _ fly. With his placement of being the lowest in their ranks, Staci was more often than not stuck with the graveyard shifts. Those shifts were filled with some drunk drivers and maybe a call about bears or ‘coons in the trash. Normal things. Easy things.

Things that weren’t nine feet tall, snarling, covered in fur, and hunting him down. AKA werewolves. Well, okay, werewolves was plural. In a strange twist of luck, if you could call it that, Staci was facing just one werewolf. And even then, he wasn’t facing it. He was running away from it and hiding in whatever nooks and crannies he could. He tried to hide behind some rocks, but he was completely visible to anyone who so much as  _ looked  _ in his direction. He tried to hide in a cave, but who knew, maybe a blissed out cave bear would kill him before the werewolf did. And finally, he found a big enough tree that he could possibly avoid getting his shit torn into.

‘Deputy Pratt we’ve got a report for a disturbance south of the F.A.N.G. Center’ 

Disturbance, his ass! When he gets back--IF he gets back he’s giving Nancy a piece of his damn mind! He’s asking for details! He’s asking what the disturbance is! He’s not getting fooled into some task that’ll leave him minced meat in the middle of the forest. Call him pessimistic, but this Junior Deputy was at least hoping they’d find his body before the vultures and eagles did. Even then, he didn’t know if that was wishful thinking. After all, if werewolves existed, then who knows what else could go wrong in the span of 24 hours. 

Speaking of things going wrong, Staci’s heart was rushing a mile a minute and his thoughts went silent. Who knew something so simple, so quiet as the sound of a monster sniffing the ground and tracking Staci would be so terrifying? Coupled with that sniffling, the thundering sound of heavy footfalls on dead leaves and broken twigs echoed throughout the forest. It was a forest Staci wanted to be out of as soon as possible. With the assistance of some rocks and branches, Staci got himself up into a tree. As a kid, climbing a tree was always fun. As an adult chased down by a werewolf, climbing trees was terrifying and fueled by fear and adrenaline. He kept still, though. He refused to move and for a while, it seemed to help. The fact that werewolf was sniffing around for him and still looking? That meant Staci was well-hid. 

But when the sniffing stopped and the werewolf went still? Staci swore he could’ve pissed himself outta fear. But he didn’t. Thank fucking god he didn’t or else he’d be dealing with another level of embarrassment that night. The sniffing and pounding footsteps stopped. Staci’s heart stopped. He held his breath. He held tight onto the branch he was wrapped around. All he could hear was the wind gently blowing by, and even then, the wind went still too. All was silent in those woods. 

The stars didn’t shine. The branches didn’t move. Staci didn’t breathe. 

Darkness took over the night’s sky. The branch lurched downwards. There was a sickening growl that filled the air. And a clawed hand snared around Staci’s leg and brought him tumbling down to the forest floor.

When he landed, there was a snap. Tried to catch himself and ended up breaking his wrist. The pain, the fear, the pain, the fear, the pain, and the wholehearted, earthshattering  _ fear  _ kept him completely still on the ground. Completely still even when the werewolf stepped closer and closer, its black fur illuminated by the full moon that peeked from behind the cloud in the night’s sky. Bloody claws and drool-soaked teeth were on full show for Staci. And his eyes closed. He braced himself for pain and by God, did he feel it. He felt searing pain overtake him. It started at his shoulder and then it filled him completely. There was no more fear, no more worry, just pain. Just pain and the internal prayer that he’d somehow make it out of there alive.

_ I want to go back to my apartment. _

_ I want to see Joey and Danny. _

_ I want to go home. _

_ I want to see my parents.  _

_ I want to make it outta here alive. _

_ Please God, just let me get out of here alive. _

_ I don’t care how just make it happen. _

And make it happen, fate did. Staci couldn’t hear it, but there was a gunshot. Loud as hell. Hit the monster. The monster ran off, tail between its legs, back up north. Or at least it looked like that direction. Staci couldn’t see a lot. He was drifting between consciousness and a comatose state he wasn’t sure he’d recover from. The person who shot the werewolf called for paramedics. There was a lot of blood lost. Not to mention the broken wrist. Staci was taken to a hospital in Missoula. When he woke up, Joey and Danny were there by his side. Neither one of them got a lot of sleep, but they were overjoyed he was awake. They told him that his doctors said he made a lot of progress. His wrist was already starting to heal and so was the bite scar covering his shoulder. The doctor’s called it a miracle. 

Staci had a feeling it might have been more of a curse.


	3. You Must Be Strong

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> July 2: Strength
> 
> This chapter takes place during the events of Far Cry 5, when Staci is stuck up in the Mountains at the Veterans Center.

It was odd how one word could be tainted by the influence of one person. In these times, that one person was Jacob Seed and the word was “Strength”. Jacob talked. He did that a lot. He did that a lot and Staci had a feeling that it was a normal trait of the Seeds to behave that way, to hear the sound of their own voice. Unfortunately, Jacob’s voice had a place in Staci’s brain, hiding there forever and managing to sneak its way into the smallest of safe spaces. Jacob’s voice ate at him like a parasite, he was taking in any thoughts Staci had and tearing them apart for his own pleasure. Staci would try to tell himself anything he could to improve his self-worth.

_I am good. **You were created to kill. Harness that. Be better.**_

_I am kind. **Kindness is weakness. There is strength in your anger. Anger gets shit done.**_

_I am strong. **You are weak. You know what you are and you deny it. You are a monster.**_

_I am not a monster. **I’ve seen what you can be, Peaches. Be that. Forget your humanity.**_

_I am human. **You will never be human again.**_

In a way, Jacob was right. It had been eight years since he was bitten, and that meant eight years of dealing with his special condition (Lycanthropy, or otherwise known as Staci’s very special pain in the ass). After eight years, Staci thought he was getting better with control. If Staci needed to, he could transform whenever he pleased. Those full moons still forced his hand, but he was getting better and that’s all that mattered. Staci was proud of his progress, and the few people who knew of his condition were proud of him too. Jacob wasn’t, though. Jacob stopped at nothing to destroy Staci control over those animal instincts. After a week, Jacob found his answer.

The Bliss and his conditioning worked together to make a molotov cocktail for Staci’s body. Repetitive music beckoned Staci to lose control of that beast inside of him, to go wild and tear apart the county and never look back to humanity. The Bliss, that drug, clouded his vision and ruined his physical awareness. He was changing without realizing it. He’d act like a Judge did when it was exposed to more Bliss. Constant exposure to the Bliss and that conditioning submerged Staci’s brain into a boiling vat of animalistic, lupine instincts, one he could never escape from. That pitiful, small, pathetic, _human_ part of his brain tried to think about how long he was under. If he could guess, he’d say maybe it’s been two weeks now.

Unlike the Judges, he wasn’t starved. He wasn’t starved to the point of exhaustion and rage. As a matter of fact, Staci was getting fed pretty often. When the werewolf was in control, his memories were far and inbetween, but he caught those glances at his meals. He remembered the venison. The bison. The boars. And even the few unlucky sinners and fighters who were deemed too weak to complete their trials or hunts. It made Staci’s stomach churn to think of all those meals he had, how everything blended together and he didn’t care if he was feasting on his allies or if he was just chowing down on the corpse of some unlucky deer a hunter shot in the woods. But the monster in control didn’t care. Food was food and it needed food to survive. It needed to eat to be strong.

Meat! It needed meat! Needed meat to be strong! It must be strong! It must survive!

The sound of its inhibitionless thoughts was like hearing radio static played on repeat. All he could hear were screams. Screams and pain. He could see everything for damn near miles but at the same time, Staci only saw the blurred edges of the world. Everything was moving too fast for his brain, his human brain, to keep up with it. When he was conscious of the world, his days moved by like hours, after all, he was keeping a pretty tight schedule thanks to when Jacob’s Chosen were allowed to let him out.

At five in the morning, he was given breakfast. A rabbit he would finish off in ten minutes.

At six in the morning, he was taunted by a Chosen before quite literally being thrown a bone. Staci gnawed on it until it broke into unsatisfying pieces.

At seven in the morning, he was let out into a larger cage where he was let loose on any sinners that were deemed unworthy to fight for The Project.

At eight in the morning he was done with that task and he napped.

At ten in the morning, he woke up and would more often than not come to with a bit of his humanity intact. A painful sliver of his brain was awake and alert to what he was and what purpose he was serving.

He’d keep that humanity alive for two hours, until noon when his hunger started to constrict tighter and tighter in his chest, where human and wolf cravings were both hitting and practically starving at the same time. Suddenly, his humanity was losing grip. Staci saw what he was in the reflection of a puddle inside of his cage.

An eclectic, monstrous mix of man and wolf for everyone to see, like something straight out of a monster movie. His fur was the same color of his hair, that dark brown that somehow radiated warmth and mysteriousness at the same time. All of that long, fluffy fur that was stained and matted with blood and drool was perfectly unique to Staci and only Staci. Only him. His eyes were like stained gold, something that shined in the night. Though it could not be told by that puddle, he stood triumphantly on his hind legs at nearly nine feet tall. He filled up his cage and was seen by outsiders as nothing but a miracle, a perfect marvel for their Project. An apex predator standing right before them in Hope County. They weren’t wrong, either. The longer that hunger clung to his stomach and to his muscles, the less Staci felt like himself and more like some other Judge, some other monster for the Project to control.

He wasn’t strong enough to fight that pain. He wasn’t strong enough to fight that hunger. He wasn’t strong enough to fight that monster inside of him. Jacob finally made it stronger than Staci, and Staci wasn’t sure if he’d get control ever again. So, Staci let go. He let go of control and he lost track of time until sundown, where he heard a whistle, a crackling radio croon out “Only You”, and a command to go hunt down sinners. And like any good dog, any good Judge, any good predator, he hunted down his prey. Claws worked like a hot knife through butter, slicing through flesh and tendons with no hesitation. A single clamp down of his jaws could shatter the bones in their bodies like they were just scarecrows made of twigs and straw. The mostly bipedal beast would shift down to run on all fours and he could easily outrun a car that was speeding by. Everything a human or wolf could be, he was more. He was evolutionary perfection, a beast that thrived off of the world Jacob was creating for it.

He hunted down his prey until they were all dead, and then within two hours, he was back in his cage as the rest of the sinners and Trial-goers were hunting down each other. 

Only five more hours until he was woken up with a rabbit and the day started over again.

Only five more hours until he proved he was STRONG again.


	4. Hey, Are Werewolves Allergic to Chocolate? Stop Laughing, I'm Serious!

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> July 3: Weakness
> 
> After the last prompt, it's time for some lighthearted fun here! This chapter is set a few weeks after Staci got bit in that first prompt. He's got some questions about this whole werewolf gig and nobody to ask them to but an unfortunate search engine.

**[Can werewolves actually get killed by silver bullets?]**

Ope. That loaded up about two million results.

**[Are werewolves allergic to chocolate?]**

Well, somehow that got even more results telling Staci that he’ll probably get intoxicated when he eats chocolate. He was only nineteen, so was it illegal for him to drink chocolate milk? That was leaving him with even more questions than answers. So, it was time to stop beating around the bush and just be up front.

**[Werewolf weaknesses.]**

See, that’s what Staci was talking about! Wait...nope. Okay it just got a lot of really weird reports from...werewolf fan-ran forum sites! Wow! Okay! He was done surfing the web for werewolf weaknesses today! He didn’t need to read the rest of those posts!

Staci didn’t have any patience to read the rest of those shitty answers written by people from roughly 2006, so he was turning his phone off for a bit. The ringtone was turned all the way down and just tossed onto his coffee table. Maybe there was a bit of a migraine coming on as Staci worked himself up over this new change of pace. Staci’s questions were more than valid! He needed to know what would and wouldn’t kill him if it got anywhere near his body. Silver was probably one of those things that was founded in truth, and he really doubted that anyone in Hope County had silver bullets. Or if anyone did, they were long done or just didn’t believe in werewolves. Staci was  _ really  _ cashing in on the idea that even though werewolves very much did exist and he was one of them, people still were living their lives blissfully ignorant of the idea that monsters lived amongst them.

“I mean, c’mon. Come the  _ fuck  _ on. Who else in this county believes in monsters, let alone werewolves. I mean. Okay. Sure. There’s Larry. Alright, whatever. And Zip. Maybe Sharky and Hurk? By extension maybe Nick? But Kim wouldn’t believe them. And Joey and Danny don’t know yet. Not even Whitehorse. Staci didn’t even tell his parents. Didn’t tell any of the friends he still had from high school. That was a trick question, though. He had absolutely  _ no  _ fucking contact with the people he knew from high school and he was more than happy to say that. If he told any of them he was a werewolf, it’d take about half a school day before the popular kids were making fun of him and calling him “furball” or “fleabag” or the age old “freak”.

But Staci’s high school based trauma could wait for another day. He was more focused on if he could have that chocolate milk in his fridge and those chocolate chip cookies that were sitting at the bottom of that cookie jar he barely ever used. Whatever, though. If anything, the memories about high school made Staci want to drown his sorrows in sugar even more. As far as Staci was concerned, those very poor online searches just told him that the only thing that could kill him was silver and there wasn’t silver in his milk or his cookies. And if chocolate intoxicated him, well, it’s better than allergies. And he could definitely live with being a bit intoxicated by chocolate. He had the day off, so he could just crash on his couch, play on his 3DS, watch TV, and call it a day. Any day he spent just lazing around his apartment was a good one.

Well! There was no reason to wait! With a gentle huff, Staci hopped up from his spot on the couch and caught his reflection in a mirror that was hanging from a nail in his wall. It was pretty stable. Pretty. Eh, whatever. It was good enough, he could see his reflection. Just a cool guy wearing a hockey jersey from back home and some sweatpants and fuzzy socks. Say what you will about his style, he didn’t care. As long as he was comfy, he couldn’t care less about what people thought he dressed like. He knew he was sexy and most people were just jealous of those badass looks of his. His badass, day off, just about to possibly get drunk or have an allergic reaction to chocolate  _ look. _

With his thoughts about his outfit occupying his brain, Staci shuffled over to his kitchen and made his way right to the fridge. When he opened it up, he was met with a mostly empty fridge. He made up for it by spreading stuff out around the fridge. Milk, eggs, two bottles of pop, some lunchmeats, the chicken he’d have for dinner, condiment packets he got from takeout and doggie bags when he brought home leftovers, butter, some cheese, a slice of cake from Nancy’s birthday party. It was a mess in there, but it was a mess Staci could work with. Sitting in the back of the fridge like it was the holy fucking grail of all the drinks he had in his apartment...was the chocolate milk. Half of the half gallon was left there and he was gonna down that shit all in one day. No more saving it for a good day.  _ Today  _ was the good day. 

With the half-full (or half-empty, everyone’s outlook is valid) half gallon of chocolate milk in one hand, Staci used the other hand to fish out the remaining two chocolate chip cookies and some miscellaneous crumbs from the bottom of the cookie jar. Chocolate chip cookies and chocolate milk. This was it. This was the feast for kings. If he could stomach this, this is where werewolf kings became werewolf gods. Yes, Staci was completely aware he was hyping himself up too much for some sweets, but if humans wanted to pre-game just to drink  _ White Claw  _ a werewolf could pre-game just to drink chocolate milk. 

The container of milk? On the coffee table.

The cookies? On a napkin on the coffee table. 

_ It was go time. _

_ This was it. He grabbed the milk. He twisted off the cap. The aroma of chocolate wafted throughout his apartment. It was honestly all he could smell. It was sweet, rich, bringing back memories of the chocolate milk he drank at lunch while the popular kids--OH GOD WE’RE NOT GOING BACK ON THAT TANGENT. But nevertheless, that chocolate milk was already smelling strong. That was foreboding pretty well for the taste Staci was about to experience. He swirled the carton around a little and then...he knocked back the carton and chugged the last remnants of that chocolate milk. _

In hindsight, Staci  _ really  _ should have saved the milk for  _ after  _ the cookies. Now he was just sitting here and he’d have to reach forward and--WHOA! Okay! He almost tipped too far ahead. Okay. Alright. Cool cool cool. Tight. Alright. He could manage this. Maybe chocolate was going to act like alcohol. Maybe he’d have to learn how to eat chocolate in moderation. Maybe chocolate milk was like alcohol in the sense you should just never, in general, chug a quarter of a gallon of it in the middle of the day. 

Those cookies were right there. Right in front of him. But at the same time. Way too far. Okay. He could lean ahead and grab them. He leaned and that already took out most of his energy. Okay maybe he could lean back. Yup. He could do this. He could lean back. Wait he was leaning back all the way into the back of the couch. And then he was leaning to the side until his head was resting on the arm of the couch.

Wow.

The couch was  _ pretty  _ comfy. He could...he could get used to this.

Just after...just after this nap.

Then he’ll have the cookies.

Just after this nap.

Short nap.

Not hours long.

…

…

It ended up being a four hour long nap.


	5. The Gem of the Night's Sky

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> July 4: Full Moon
> 
> Time to experience Staci's first full moon! Yay! Yay for us, not for him I mean. This shit sucks for him!

Staci was bitten a month ago. Thirty days since he was bitten on a night where a full moon hung in the sky like a beautiful pearl that even the most cynical souls would adore. That was one of the upsides to living out in the country, living away from the city street lights and light pollution that’d drown out all of the stars. The pleasant solitude, the mostly quiet nights, the stars and constellations that kept the night sky company, and best of all, the feeling of home. Even after being hunted down by a rabid, massive werewolf, Staci was still happy to call this place home. After all, where else could he live where he could suddenly show intense cravings for meat and increased senses and everyone would just act like he was normal? Everyone was a little odd in Hope County, so maybe a werewolf could blend in.

Realistically, though, Staci could only blend in for so long before things were going to get a little...hairy. Okay, yeah, werewolf pun jabbing at Staci’s unfortunate luck aside, he really _was_ worried for his safety and the safety of others the closer and closer he got to the full moon and who fucking _knew_ what could happen if he went feral and he was around his _friends._ Staci could stand the pain it would cause himself, but he couldn’t even stomach the idea of him hurting his friends or doing something even worse. He saw far too many werewolf movies where best friends turned on each other, lovers were killed, families were separated, or the werewolf ended up dead and nobody was there to remember them for who they were. In this moment, Staci was hoping that his life was not a work of fiction.

He wasn’t some teenager who was good at basketball.

He wasn’t some dude backpacking in Europe with his friend.

He wasn’t even some priest who got a firework shot into his eye.

He wasn’t the rest of those sad, angsty stories about werewolves that filled media and fables alike.

He was Staci fucking Pratt and he was going to get through this. He wasn’t going to kill anyone. He was going to be one of those benevolent werewolves that was in legends like in Ireland. Staci remembered those tales of werewolves who were protectors from his late night searches on random incognito tabs online! If he had a werewolf role model he could follow in their footsteps, err, sorry, tracks? Is tracks the right word? Eh, whatever! He’d be a good guy and he wouldn’t let himself follow down the path the werewolf that _tore him open_ went down. 

It was easier said than done, because _days_ ago he felt himself start to get on edge. Little mistakes at work that he usually laughed at were causing him to get _actually_ mad (not that he spoke out on it or anything, he just kept his emotions inside and they’ll stay there for a while until he forgets about them). Whenever someone would laugh at his jokes, something said they were laughing at _him_ and that only served to get him ticked off further. Someone tapping on a desk made him see red. Speeders and people drinking under the influence got under his nails a _hell_ of a lot more. Someone spit on him and he wanted to go out in a field and scream about it for like five hours! His mom hung up on the phone with him because _she_ hated _his_ attitude (which was the exact opposite of what normally happened). Everything that could go wrong _was_ going wrong and Staci wasn’t nearly patient enough to deal with that! 

Okay, so, maybe the full moon approaching was stressing him out! Maybe it was that fact he had a monster living rent free inside of his brain, his body, his very DNA, that was stressing him out and destroying him from the inside. He was stressing and falling apart and that was making him in perfect condition for the full moon. Perfect condition for…

Staci looked at his calendar.

**_Tonight._ **

Shit. Shit. Shit shit shit shit! Motherfucker! HOW WAS IT TONIGHT?! How was it this soon? It couldn’t be tonight. It couldn’t. That was way too soon. Staci knew he procrastinated a lot in high school and also a lot when it came to online college classes and _also_ when it came to work, but Staci had no clue he could possibly procrastinate the fact he was, all due respect to himself (which with the added occasional self-loathing, sometimes that respect waned), a monster! Or if he wanted to give himself some credit, about to turn into a monster that night!

And that shit was stressful! Sure, he had those fictional role models he could follow, but it wasn’t like there was a line of Hope County’s werewolves waiting to tell him how to not completely fuck up his life beyond repair. He asked the day off, so he had ample time to sit around and make an internal checklist and see what he could do for himself.

Staci did not own any chains or ropes, so he couldn’t just tie himself to a tree and call it a night.

Staci didn’t have a basement, so he couldn’t lock himself down there until he tired himself out. Hell, his closet couldn’t even fit a normal sized Staci, let alone a werewolf that was...oh god, Staci didn’t even know how tall he was going to get. Whatever clothes he wore, he was going to destroy those. And he didn’t have the will to go replace his closet once a month, so he guessed he was going to have to go take a trip to a secondhand store and get some old, cheap clothes he wouldn’t miss. 

Staci wasn’t going to mess around with any potions or poisons. His grade in chemistry was a solid C and he wasn’t trying to push his luck when brewing a drink that could either just knock him out or, y’know, kill him without a second thought. 

The more Staci thought about his chances of making it throughout the night and managing to not kill someone or get killed by somebody else, the more worried he got. His leg shook under the table and his hands tapped on the stained wood surface. There was so much out of his control, it was time to take care of himself and reduce his stress by dealing with something he could actually change. His normal apparel of a flannel shirt and jeans weren’t going to cut it for tonight, so he could go to a secondhand store. It was about five o’clock. He could handle this.

It didn’t take him long to get downstairs and into the parking lot, making an anxious beeline straight to his truck and unlocking it before he climbed in and put on his seatbelt. What? Even mythological creatures of immense strength were prone to car crashes. As he did hundreds of times before, Staci just put the key in the ignition, turned on the truck, and he was well on his way to getting himself some new old clothes. With far too much on his brain, he didn’t stick around the store too long and look at the knick-knacks. He was in and out in ten minutes flat, a cruddy shirt talking about fishing and a pair of pajama pants in a reusable bag. Okay, he was a monster physically, but he could still do his part to reduce pollution. Be the change you wanna see in the world, people.

Clothes? Check. 

Dinner he could load up on before the moon rose and he transformed? Not check.

All it took was a call to Chad Wolanski and asking for a bunch of his roadkill and Staci was set up. Thankfully, he was still in his truck so he just drove to Chad’s one stop chop shop and picked up his feast! Yeah, it cost a bunch, but it was worth it! It’d keep Staci fed for a long time! Excusing himself for his picky eating, Staci just drove out down a country road and when he found a nice, swell dead end where he could chill out and enjoy the oncoming sunset. A few styrofoam boxes of roadkill were torn through in about ten minutes. He felt full, the roadkill was eaten down to the bone, and now Staci was just left to his own devices in his truck. Realistically, he could’ve spent some time chilling in the truck bed, but he decided against it. He didn’t want to wake up from a food nap because he was turning into some monster. Trying as hard as he could, he took a mental note of the road his truck was last on and the landmarks around him. Maybe when he transformed back he’d remember, but for now, he saw that sun was setting and he needed to book it away from any roads or barns or buildings or...anything. He didn’t want to cause destruction. He just wanted this night to be over with.

Staci even took off his boots and left them in the truck, understanding that whatever he’d become would _probably_ just destroy the shoes anyway. Those things cost a nice bit and Staci wasn’t losing them tonight! Something he was losing though was his track of time. He had been running for a bit now, that dash turning into a jog that ended up as a walk. The sun set more and he was just biding his time until the moon first peaked over the horizon. A few minutes after his thought was brought into the world, it was manifested in the darkening sky and the appearance of stars. The moon’s course began, and Staci no longer saw the moon as some beautiful gem in the sky. Now it was a harbinger of awful things to come.

Nevertheless, Staci kept walking. He kept on moving until the moon was too strong and its light was beaming down right on him. 

“If I don’t look at you, you aren’t going to hurt me.” Staci shivered, feeling his bones ache from the moon’s attention. But something told him to look at the moon, like he was Orpheus and the moon was his Eurydice. Listened to that voice, he did. And paying for it, he was. The moment he looked back, his whole body was bathed in moonlight, and it was like every nerve and cell in his body were firing off at once.

A deafening scream pierced through the air, one that tapered off into a weak howl, one that came directly from Staci. His voice was not even his own anymore. Every moment that passed, Staci lost more and more control to that monster. His mind and body were corrupting and shifting and his humanity rotted away inside of him. Visions of comfort and family were replaced with the hunt, replaced with survival and hunger and wrath and blood and--

A second scream from Staci, this one echoed less than the last one and ended off in a quiet, pitiful whine. Pain surged through him in waves. The first wave knocked him to his knees and he could feel a surge of power course through him. Adrenaline shot off and his body buzzed, it buzzed with power and it buzzed from _warmth_ , a certain warmth that came from a thick, soft covering of dark brown fur growing from every pore in his skin. It warmed him up until he was far too warm. Burning even. Hotter. Building and building. Fur cascaded down his back as it did the rest of him, making him appear even larger than before. His pupils were constricted, pinpoint, almost as his irises turned from his natural brown into a glowing golden. A quick twitch of his neck, a soft pop escaping from the tense joints and muscles and bones. The first of many of the night.

In a slightly less painful change, more pops escaped from his back as a tail was now behind him. For a moment, it wagged behind him, but it went still as more changes poked and prodded at him. At the same time, the shift continued across his entire body. A human face reshaping into a muzzle with a mouth filled with long, sharpened fangs. Wolf’s ears grew on either sides of his head. 

Muscles snapped and tore and grew in all newer, all stronger, all ready to tear into its prey. Bones cracked and reshaped themselves, as if some cruel god was taking each bone and molding it and twisting it into a new form, more fitting for the lupine creature he was bound to become. Muscles grew larger and stronger, rending the two dollar shirt useless as it was tore to shreds. Less eloquently, though, it just dropped to the ground in a torn up pile and the faint popping and cracking of his vertebrae and other bones shifting only grew faster as his extremities changed. Monstrous claws jutted out of each hand and toe, and as they made their appearance, his transformation surged up his lower half, leaving his pants in shreds as his legs took on a more digitigrade appearance.

A body that was filled with pain finally hit its endless high, where eternal strength and agility were maxxed out as his human mind was left blissfully unaware of the beast that was left in control. It didn’t care about rules or role models. It cared about one thing and one thing only.

**_Survival._ **

And good luck to anything or anyone that crossed its path on that night where monsters ran rampant in Hope County. A night where when the monster formerly known as Staci Pratt leaned back and howled into the night, he received an answer.

There were more beasts like him in Hope County.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> July 5: Hidden
> 
> This one's set a little bit before the events of the game, going into a fun encounter where Stace's identity as a werewolf NEARLY gets found out.

“Hope County is infested with monsters!”

“Beware the beasts that roam the countryside! They eat your cattle and your dreams!”

“Those Eden’s Gate vampire fucks are colluding with werepossums to seize the government from the people!”

Zip Kupka could just  _ not  _ shut the fuck up, could he? The series of hot takes were being thrown at Staci at quite literally a hundred miles per hour, as Staci got a call from someone about Zip stirring up trouble outside their house. Seems like Zip was going door to door like some rejected salesman, telling them all about the hottest conspiracy theories he had the night before. Now, some people like Larry Parker would eat that shit up, but mostly everyone else in the county got tired of it. And when people got tired of Zip, it was time for the authorities to show up and listen to him now. Joey and Whitehorse were smarter than Staci and they’d just get him in the back of the patrol car, ignore his words, and either drive him home with a warning or drop him off at the jail to get booked.  _ Again. _

Staci, however, made plenty of mistakes in his life. Eight year ago he made the mistake of answering a call that ended with him bit by a werewolf, but it’s fine. Everything’s fine now, that part of his life where he was terrified of his identity was way over. He was a werewolf, plain and simple. Well, as simple as a werewolf could be. However, listening to Zip was really just teetering between the edge of “this is entertainment” to “this is super regrettable and I want to go home now”. Perhaps, if we could put this on a scale, we’d call it “Listening to you is a waste of government dollars but that’s the government’s problem”.

But listening to Zip right now? This wasn’t that much of a mistake. Most of the things Zip said were like phrases you’d hear on the History Channel in the middle of the night, talking about how aliens from outer space were contaminating the water supply in order to create new hosts for their alien overlords or something like that. This was  _ not  _ that. This was a jab at monsters. At beasts. At...werepossums? Okay that fact was kinda skewed and screwed up, but the talk of werecreatures and monsters was something that piqued Staci’s interests. 

Had Zip seen what Staci was?

Did Zip see one of the other werewolves running around Hope County?

Somehow, someway, was Zip right for once? In a weird, roundabout way was Zip right about the existence of monsters running around Hope County? And was Staci standing there, mentally agreeing with Zip? Yes. For once in Zip’s life, his conspiracy theories were right. Granted, there were were _ wolves  _ and not were _ possums,  _ but two outta three theories being right was better than none being right. Now all Staci could do was hope that Zip didn’t realize that the Deputy standing before him was one of those werecreatures he was swearing his hatred upon. Here Staci thought he was a pretty obvious person who couldn’t keep a secret to save his life, but now Staci was hidden in plain sight.

Zip kept rambling on and on, convinced that Staci was just  _ not  _ listening to him which meant that he just needed to speak louder. Yes, that did hurt the  _ shit  _ outta Staci’s ears and he didn’t want to think about the things he wanted to tell Zip to get him to shut up. Instead, Staci just let him go with some slight provocations. 

“Hey Zip, what if werewolves were in Hope County?” 

“Don’t be stupid, the werewolves are in London and controlling Parliament. There are man sized rodents in these towns and they’re going to sell us out to wererodent overlords who work with Eden’s Gate!”

“Sounds nice, Zip. Let’s just get in the car and take you home, alright?”

“My voice will never be silenced, Deputy Asshat!” 

“Just…Get in the car.”


End file.
